


bound to get together / bound to be together

by mathonwys



Category: The Yogscast
Genre: F/M, Flux Buddies, Panda Labs, bodyswap fic, set after flux buddies 1.0 #66
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-06-25
Updated: 2015-08-03
Packaged: 2018-04-06 03:57:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 2,250
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4207038
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mathonwys/pseuds/mathonwys
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>Nano groaned and rolled back up to her feet and stared at what was before her.</i><br/><i>Nano was absolutely, 100% sure she hadn't expected to see herself thrashing around in her bed and screaming in the grips of a Flux-induced nightmare.</i><br/>Something has gotten a bit scrambled, and now the Flux Buddies are in each others' bodies. Nano just wants to go back to bed.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. out of body experience

**Author's Note:**

> hi hello this is non-canon to "im looking at you through the glass" but references some events in it so !! you should read that first to avoid confusion
> 
> every fandom needs a body swap au, yea? i know there's already one for the flux buds but i wanted to try my own take on it :>
> 
> i don't know how long this will be? this is just a fun thing for me to goof off with when i'm feeling down.
> 
> titles from "shut up and dance" by walk the moon!

The first thing Nano felt when she woke up was "ow".

She hissed through her teeth and scrunched up as pain surged through her like her nerves had been set on fire. "Mother _ **fucker**_ ," she spat out, then puzzled over the fact that her voice was deeper than she remembered it being. Everything felt... weird, too. Like her idea of where her body parts where and what she looked like no longer matched what she was. And there was something... missing. As the pain simmered down to bearable levels (or maybe she was just getting use to it), Nano found herself mentally reaching out for something that wasn't there.

Her eyes shot open, and she realized she could see. She closed her left eye experimentally and almost swore again as she realized that she could _**see**_ , clear as day, through the eye that had gradually gone blind ever since she'd fallen into the Flux.

The Flux was gone.

_**Why was the Flux gone?!** _

Conflicting emotions rushed through her so fast that she felt like she might be sick. Nano closed her eyes tightly and fought back against the wave of nausea threatening to overwhelm her; after what felt like ages, it receded, leaving only the constant, throbbing pain behind. "Ugh," she groaned, and again wrinkled her face in displeasure at how odd her voice sounded to her ears. It... actually sounded a little familiar, but she couldn't place it. Nano pushed herself up and groaned as the pain lanced up a few notches. Everything felt so weird, and she couldn't place why...

Her train of thought was sharply interrupted by a scream in her own voice.

Nano sprung to her feet and swayed as her head came up higher than it should've. Her surroundings came into focus, but only raised more questions: Why was she down in the computer room?! Barnabus beeped at her in concern as she rushed up the ladder as fast as she could handle. She felt heavier than when she had gone to sleep, but also _**stronger**_ , and it threw her off a little as she launched herself onto the bedroom floor. Nano groaned and rolled back up to her feet and stared at what was before her.

Nano was absolutely, 100% sure she hadn't expected to see herself thrashing around in her bed and screaming in the grips of a Flux-induced nightmare.

"What the hell," she stammered, and reached out to her duplicate as if expecting them to be a mirage. But the hands she held out weren't hers. She couldn't feel her right arm below the elbow, and they were both covered by thick black gloves she'd seen a million and one times before. Nano's heart stuck in her throat. With shaking fingers, she pulled the right glove off. Dented in places, with the paint job scratched up and one finger missing, Lalna's trusty Power Tool came into view.

"Oh my God. This can't be happening." She realized with rising horror that it was _**his**_ voice coming out of her mouth right now, distorted by hearing it echo in her own head, and Nano looked down at herself to see herself wearing the trademark battered and stained labcoat that had probably never seen the inside of a washing machine. "There's no _**fucking**_ way." She pulled the purple shirt up and felt another surge of nausea as she saw the scars lacing her-- his-- her torso, and her eyes lingered on the one that went in a straight line from the collarbone to the navel.

It was the scar she'd given him back in New Camelot. She remembered vividly how her sword had cut through him; she remembered panicking as he reacted like it was just a scratch; she remembered the bottle of painkillers, and suddenly the pain she'd been in since she woke up made sense.

> "You're in pain _**all the time**_?"

Another scream from the Nano on the bed snapped her out of her thoughts and, without a second thought, she shook them awake. "Shh," Nano mumbled reassuringly. "Shh. Wake up. It's just a nightmare, She can't hurt you. Come on, get up." The phrases left her like she'd said them a million times before, yet there was an odd feeling to them; she'd only ever _**heard**_ them before, when on the cusp of being awake and asleep with Mother whispering in her ears. Slowly, the other Nano's thrashing stopped, and she could almost hear their heart pounding (or maybe she was remembering her own heart pounding) as the nightmare faded into nothingness and they opened their eyes.

"What the fuck," her own voice said to her. 


	2. this is a nightmare!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lalna wakes up in the wrong body. Nano slowly loses her mind. Everything is a bit too complicated.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a bit messy because my previous idea for Lalna's reaction got shot down soon as i progressed further in flux buds :V;;
> 
> speaking of, i WILL be doing a Lalnable fic in the "through glass" continuity as soon as i'm able, just wanted to do something lighthearted first~

Everything is pulsing around him with a thousand whispering voices. He can feel the tendrils wrapping around his heart and squeezing him so tight he can't breathe; he struggles against them, but there's too many to fight off. All the while the voices are whispering in his ears, telling him about Mother, and he's screaming--

and another voice breaks through, one oddly familiar and soothing, and the voices retreat and the Flux's grip loosens just enough for him to open his eyes.

Lalna stared. Standing over him was himself.

For a heart-stopping moment, he was fearful that it was Lalnable-- whoever he was, and the salvaged research notes had been burning a hole in his head ever since they found it-- but there was no menace on their face, just... _confusion_. Pretty much a mirror of what he felt now. One glove was off to reveal his Power Tool, but it had been broken since fleeing the castle, and the way they held their arm reminded him of when he'd only just grafted it to himself after the... "accident".

"What the hell," he said, and paused. His voice had changed. No, more than that-- the other Lalna was taller than him, and something was crawling under his skin, and the nightmare--

"What the _**hell**_ ," he repeated, and almost fell over as he tried to stand up. The other Lalna (a clone? No, he'd heard they'd all been decommissioned after he'd been fired, so he was the only Lalna now, no matter what "Lalnable" meant) supported him as his head swam with a jumbled mess of thoughts. One of his eyes didn't work. He closed his left eye, but all he saw out of the other was... _**purple**_.

Gears turned in his brilliant mind, and he realized that for the first time in five years he couldn't hear the workings of _actual_ mechanisms inside himself. He wasn't in his own body. And if he was infected with the Flux, and if his body was standing right in front of him...

"Nano?" he asked meekly. "Is that you?"

He could see her hesitate, likely trying to come up with a snappy retort, then her shoulders slumped as she admitted defeat. "Yeah." She crossed her arms and rested her head on her shoulder, like he'd often seen her do, but the gesture was made uncanny by her being in the wrong body. "And no, this isn't any of my witchery stuff," she snapped in defense before he could say anything. "What about you? Any science up your sleeve?"

"Nope." He held his arms out in an attempt to placate her. "I don't know anything about this! The last thing I remember is going to bed after coming home from the castle."

"Great. Just great." Nano plonked down on the couch and groaned loudly. Lalna sat next to her, still baffled by the suddenly reversed size difference. "We're not going to be stuck like this forever, are we? ...Are we?"

Lalna hesitated.

"Change me back!" Nano yelled as she grabbed the front of Lalna's cheongsam and shook him hard. "Change me back, you idiot!! What're we going to do?! What if Hat Films decides to crash in on us?! What about my vacation?!" She let go and dropped to her knees in a dramatic fashion. " _ **I'M NEVER GONNA GET TO GO ON VACATION!**_ "

"Well, maybe you can consider this a vacation?" Lalna posited. "It's a vacation out of your own body!"

"I am going to murder you." Nano seethed and got to her feet. "As soon as we switch back, you are a dead man, Dr. Lalna Coffee."

Lalna jumped on any topic that wasn't 'my apprentice is going to kill me'. "See, look, I can't be Lalnable, my last name isn't Hecto--"

"WHAT THE HELL KIND OF A LAST NAME IS _**COFFEE**_?!" she screamed. "SHUT THE FUCK UP AND FIX THIS--"

Something crashed below them, and the next thing they heard was a yowl from downstairs.

" _ **\--TIDDLES!**_ "


	3. purple pants

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The fight has been defused, and an answer may have been found. But will it make the situation better or worse?

It took the better part of an hour to rescue Tiddles from where she'd trapped herself underneath the computer cabling. By then, the argument had defused, and if anyone was spying on the Flux Buddies they would've been treated to the strange sight of Nano hard at work on the computer and Lalna feeding the Twilight Forest animals before retreating into the witchcraft hut. Drawing chalk lines with a prosthetic arm was frustrating, however, as was moving around machines that suddenly weighed as much as he did, and so the body-swapped duo reluctantly gave up on their work for the day to meet back up on the ground floor.

"This is stupid," Nano complained. Her joints and muscles were still in pain, even after spending the better part of a day sitting in a meadow and trying to coax Billy over to her; she couldn't understand how the hell Lalna dealt with this day-in, day-out. She'd still given him a grateful look when he pulled the painkillers out of the cabinet and given them to her. "How does this kind of thing happen? Did lightning strike us when we were asleep? Was it something in Lalnable's evil, evil lair?"

"IF it was something Lalnable did, we would've noticed it before we left," Lalna posited. "Although I did feel tingly after we dismantled the reactor..."

"Great. Tingly." Nano rolled her eyes. "I was feeling a bit tingly, too, but I figured that was because of the Flux. ...Which I no longer have." She was still scratching at her arms, though; thankfully, the thick layers of lab coat and gloves combined prevented any lasting marks on her buddy's skin. "Speaking of. How're you feeling?"

"Weird." Lalna looked down at his purple-stained hands. "I... I understand what you mean now, about the voices." His eyes unfocused. "I can hear Mother."

"Oooookay, that's enough of that." Nano leaned over and thwacked him on the side of the head. Lalna sputtered and chased her off. "Seriously, am I really that creepy when in, like, Flux Mode? Or are you just pulling my leg?"

"Pretty sure that was the real deal." Lalna rubbed the side of his head and groaned. "You really don't know your own strength. Or uh, my strength. I don't know! This is so... bonkers."

"Bonkers," Nano echoed. "Okay, science man. Now what?"

"...I don't know." Lalna slumped over. "We might need some outside help for this. What about Kirin?"

"Still busy findin' a home, I think." Nano rubbed her temples as she thought. "I've been looking at the spellbook he gave me, but it's hard to do things in your stupid body! What about all the Thaumcraft things we picked up?"

"Oh!" Lalna jumped to his feet. "That's right! I'll set up a Thaumcraft lab right away. That should at least point us towards the answer!"

"I hope so," Nano whined. "For _**your**_ sake."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [9:39:40 PM] Sir Jorbington: MAKE BELIEVES REBORN  
> [9:39:55 PM] ★ niiue ★: what should i name this fic chapter  
> [9:40:04 PM] ignums | neon: seven rings in hand  
> [9:40:26 PM] ★ niiue ★: my fav part ab secret rings was the non-stage music was named after clothing articles  
> [9:40:31 PM] ★ niiue ★: so there was a song we liked named PURPLE PANTS  
> [9:40:33 PM] ★ niiue ★: in all-caps  
> [9:40:45 PM] ignums | neon: thats jays theme  
> [9:40:54 PM] ★ niiue ★: i can believe it  
> [9:41:04 PM] ★ niiue ★: fuck it im naming this chapter purple pants


	4. radiation safety

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> One stupid idea after another. That's the Flux Buddies way!

Nano did her best to sit still while Lalna scanned her with the thaumometer. She remembered the stupid device-- last time Lalna had waved it at her, the results had been completely incomprehensible, and she still didn't understand what it meant even if Lalna did. Lalna's explanation of why he was doing this was completely incomprehensible as well; something about seeing if he got the same results as before even with the body swap, in the hopes that it would give them a clue of how to undo it.

"You don't have enough knowledge to understand this," Lalna read off. He groaned and set the thaumometer back on the table. "Well that's a bust."

"You're a bust." Nano laid down on the couch with her back to him and huffed. The couch felt a lot smaller with her new body, and it took all her willpower to stay still and not roll off. "What's your next plan, Mr. Smart Guy?"

"Nukes?"

"You have to be joking." She looked over her shoulder at him and smiled a little at the sheepish expression on his face. "If you say anything about radiation, I'm firing you."  
Lalna looked taken aback. "You can't fire me! I'm the boss!"

"Nuh uh." Nano fished around in her pockets, then pulled out the laminated ID that Lalna liked to use to prove that yes, he was a scientist. "I'VE got the pants on now."  
Lalna groaned. "You're a maniac."

"And you want to nuke us!"

"I don't know!" Lalna threw his arms in the air. "Flux, radiation exposure, Lalnable's lab, thaumcraft... Any of it could be the reason we're switched! Maybe it's all of the above!"  
"But you don't know." Nano sat up. "You don't know, and you're willing to try any dumb idea just to see if it works."

Lalna tilted his head. "Yeah. Aren't you?"

"...Yeah." Nano slumped over. "Come on, pack your bags. Let's  go back to the castle and see what we find."


End file.
